Bodies at Rest
by Polly Lynn
Summary: "It's all the ways he seduces her that make it a ridiculous question, but he still wonders. He really wonders." A short WIP (4 chapters, eventually), set in Season 5, but no spoilers.
1. Remain in Motion

Title: Bodies at Rest

WC: ~3200

Spoilers: Set in Season 5, but no spoilers.

Summary: "It's all the ways he seduces her that make it a ridiculous question, but he still wonders. He really wonders."

Rating: M

A/N: An idea that took hold of me while I was getting a massage. It'll have at least 2 chapters, and this is me, so, let's face it: Probably at least 3. This first chapter is a bit of PWP. The next will have a bit more substance. Maybe. Or maybe just more schmoopy porn to get Cora Clavia through the week. WHO CAN SAY WHAT BRAIN WILL DO.

* * *

"Am I your type?"

His fingers are tripping over her bare skin when he asks. Her head is heavy against the pillows, but her spine is like a wave with her ribcage rising on it to meet their warmth. Rising even though she's exhausted, and thirty seconds ago she would have sworn she was spent. _Completely._ But now her spine is curling up from the bed and her ribs seek his fingertips and she's making the kind of noises that she hates to think of coming from her.

All things considered, the question is a little silly.

She laughs. A melody made from the quick, jagged breaths he drags from her, because it's more than a little silly. It's almost . . . she rolls her head to the side and does a double take. The light through the bedroom windows has come and gone and it has to be . . . _God _. . . it has to be late.

His hand reverses its course.

"Am I, Beckett?" he asks again. He kisses her shoulder and rasps his cheek against the skin there. Kisses it again, chafing and soothing over and over. But really, he's hiding his face, and that means he's serious. He really wonders.

"Am I your type?" he asks again. _Again. _

But all she has in her at the moment—the only thing she has at her disposal—is another laugh and there's a groan mixed in that sounds like surrender. Her eyes find the blue glow of the bedside clock and it's practically noon, but this is definitely surrender.

He's been at this since before seven. Closer to six. When he was heavy with sleep and barely functional, because she's the morning person and he's not. And still—_still_—the things he can do to her body, even when he's half asleep. Even without most of his words. It's criminal the things he can do to her. The things he's doing to her right now.

But he wonders. Even with all the different ways he seduces her. Even with this. _This_ right now. _Again_, though she can hardly believe it. He wonders.

Even though it's not just this, and he knows that. It's not just her blood pounding and her breath making a fool of her. It's the way he coaxes her back to sleep afterward. With his hands and his words and heavy, soothing kisses. It's the way he coaxes, and her body says yes. _Yes_. She needs this. She needs him just like this and he _knows_.

It's the way he calms her, and he knows that, too. He calms her when she wakes up frantic an hour later. More like two, but he won't concede the point.

He teases her into some silly conversation about what, exactly, will happen if she sleeps in on a Sunday. How the streets of New York will devolve into chaos and civilization itself will crumble. How the end will come. He has her wondering—actually considering—whether it will be zombies or a virus or just a memo delivered to a league of supervillains: _Finally, we strike! Kate Beckett, NYPD, is sleeping in. Today, brothers and sisters (but mostly brothers), we strike!_

It's the way he leaves her weak and helpless with laughter while he scurries off to the kitchen and scavenges for things for breakfast in bed. The suspicious timing of coffee set up to brew and artfully arranged fruit and cereal. Skim milk that he won't touch. _Premeditation._ He planned this. He planned it, and he rushes back in, looking relieved that she's still lounging against the pillows.

It's the fact that it never crossed her mind to get up while the getting was good. _Never._

He's clumsy and even more unfiltered than usual, and it's that, too. He apologizes for what's missing and explains what's there and sets the tray over lap with this shy, hopeful reverence that undoes her. It's that, too.

It's the way his face lights up when she digs in because it's good. Simple things, but so good and she didn't even know she was hungry, but he did. He did, and she pats the bed next to her and his face lights up like it's not his bed. Like he needs an invitation.

It's the way it starts all over again, then. Coffee on his tongue and peanut butter on her fingertips because he loves jelly on his toast and she doesn't. And it starts all over again, because he tastes so good and it's different when she's full and contented.

Different from the urgent edge of first thing in the morning. It's different, and this time they just doze a little afterward. Not sleep. She couldn't possibly sleep this late in the day no matter how heavy her eyelids are and how warm she is fitted just so against his side.

And then there's the crossword. When she insists that she _has _to get up. A low, lazy argument and she yanks the covers down and tries to insist that she has things to do and she absolutely cannot stay in bed a second longer. And there's the crossword, and where was he even hiding that? And why she doesn't just call him on it? Why doesn't she throw off the covers and tell him that he's completely transparent?

But she doesn't. It's another thing that never occurs to her. That she could do anything other than glare at him and snatch the pen from his hand, even though it's so _obvious_. It's so transparent what he's doing. Offering her a _pencil _and making a show of putting the stopwatch away so that she clambers over him to reach into his bedside table to get it. So that he can grab her by the hips and pepper her sides and belly with kisses and raspberries and assurances that he'll go easy on her. And that's how they get here. _Now. This. Again. _

It's all the ways he seduces her that make it a ridiculous question, but he still wonders.

He really wonders.

* * *

"Am I your type?" he asks again, but it's been too long. He's moved on from it. Not because he doesn't wonder.

It's light and teasing now, but practiced. Brittle and far away. He sounds . . . not like the man she pulled out of his own launch party four years ago. Glib and cynical and hard edged. It's not that bad. Not quite that bad.

But he doesn't sound like himself. The man she knows now. The man who bartered for raspberries and pressed a lazy, open grin against her cheek when he won. He doesn't sound like that at all, and she can't believe it was just a little while ago that he did.

"I want to know, Beckett." He pitches his voice low. It's conversational. It's seductive. It's calculated.

But it's true, too. It's still true. He wants to know.

He wonders and all she's done is laugh. He's moved on.

Her heart tumbles noisily in her chest. She thinks he must be able to hear it. His lips are poised just above it and it's knocking against her ribs. She's pressing herself into every part of him she can reach. She's raking her fingernails through his hair and trying to get close, but there's a kind of urgent regret in it now. Sorrow that she missed the moment.

"I mean . . . I know I can do this . . ." He curves one broad palm around the side of her breast as his other hand strokes down her side. His thumb sweeps up the underside of it in an arc, just barely—just barely—grazing her nipple and her body gives chase without consulting her. Her skin tightens and rises up into a long shiver. She strains closer, but he's moving on again. _Again_.

"I know I can do this," he repeats. He brushes a morning-rough cheek over the inside of her breast and follows with his tongue. His teeth catch the very tip of one nipple just for an instant and she gasps. "I can do this, but am I your type, Kate?"

She wants to answer, but the words are crowded right off her tongue by the sounds she hates to think of coming from her. They're chased out of her head by the way both hands roam down her sides now. The way they land on her hips with purpose. With intent. She wants to answer, but he's moving on.

He's not looking for that kind of answer anymore. He's not looking for it, because he doesn't think he'll find it. He doesn't think she'll give it to him, and he'll take what he can get. What she can give. She gets a little frantic at that. Thinking of it like that, she gets a little frantic. She tugs at his hair and struggles. She doesn't know whether she's trying to pull him closer or push him away.

It doesn't matter. She missed the moment. Her fists fall to her sides and find purchase on the sheets. His body is half draped over hers, solid and irresistible. His hands are heavy and deliberate, dragging slowly down and down and coaxing her thighs apart.

He's laughing softly now. His mouth is open against the lowest sweep of her ribs. He's worrying the skin there with the flat of his teeth. He's laughing as one finger zig zags lazily down her stomach. As it trails through the soft patch of hair, and now it's not so lazy any more. Now it sends a jolt all through her and pulls his name from her one letter at a time.

"Did I do this, Kate? _This._"

He's not laughing now, but he's not really asking, either. Even though his cheek is propped against her hip and he's looking up at her through heavy lashes, and now—right now—he's so much more like the man she knows, he's not really asking.

His finger dips into her, shallow and lackadaisical. Like it's a curious thing. Like it's an interesting fact that she's burning. Another broad finger joins the first. Repeats the meandering pattern, and she's going mad because he's sprawled across her and she can't _move _and he won't—he _won't—_she doesn't even know what. He just _won't _and she's going out of her mind.

And suddenly they're gone. His fingers are gone. He's gone. Suddenly she's twisting on to her side and pressing her thighs together. Trying to get at him. Straining for contact.

But he brings his knee up between them. One hand locks around the curve of her hip. He keeps her at arm's length. She squirms and mewls—actually _mewls_—and doesn't give a damn. She needs to be closer. She needs him back.

But he doesn't react to it. The mewling or the insistent motion of her hips. To any of it. There's no low chuckle or teasing comment. He's silent as he fixes her in place and slides up the bed. He nudges her chin up with the back of his hand, and her eyes fly open. He waits a beat, then nods like he knows she's watching. Like he knows she'll keep watching. He brings his fingers to his lips. His tongue snakes out and drags over them. One at a time. Both together.

She's watching. He means to stare her down. She thinks so, anyway, but his eyes flutter open and closed at the taste of her, and there's a rumble low in his throat and all through his chest and she's on him. She breaks his grip on her hip and drags his hand to her breast. Her other hand cups the base of his skull and pulls his mouth to hers. She sweeps her tongue eagerly against his and echoes his moan when she finds what she's looking for.

"You," she says fiercely as she presses herself against him. As she straddles his thigh and arches eagerly against his hand as he squeezes and pinches and drags the rough pads of his fingers over her breast. _"You, you you."_

He's gone for a minute. Out of his body and his mind. He's disoriented and lost and simply reacting, but something about the word—the single syllable and the way it turns into a chant on her lips—that brings him back to himself. His hands tangle in her hair and he tugs, not quite breaking the kiss, but slowing it. He runs the very tip of his tongue over her lips.

"This, Kate?" he murmurs. "I did this?"

"Yes. You, you," she whispers back as her fingernails dig into his shoulders and her tongue chases his. As she writhes and bucks and struggles to get closer. "You."

He shakes his hands loose from her hair and marks long, deliberate trails down her back. He hooks his fingers behind her thighs and settles her astride his hips.

She inhales sharply at the hard length suddenly between her legs and tries to surge against him, but wide palms hold her still. He arranges himself underneath her and ducks his head to find her mouth again. He gentles her with a kiss. Harsh breaths become soft, pleading sounds and he nods.

He rolls his hips up toward her and loosens his hold on her thighs a fraction, urging her to move with him. Her fingers tighten at his shoulders like she wants to resist, but then the head of his cock nudges against her clit and she's lost. Sliding back and forth over the length of him while he breathes encouragement against her lips, her throat, her ear.

She's fighting him. She slides higher and tries to raise her hips. She wants him inside her. She sinks her teeth into the thick cord of muscle in his neck and pleads, but he's _determined_. His hands tighten again. He twitches his hips hard into the mattress. Away from her, so there's nothing to do but give in. Nothing to do but move with him in a long, hot slide. She arches her hips against his hands and her head drops to his shoulder.

"You, Castle," she says, and she doesn't even know what she means.

He seems to. She feels him relax. She feels the relief rolling off him and it's tempting—it's so tempting—to fight back again, but his voice is in her ear. One word at a time. Her name. That he loves doing this to her. Loves her body and her skin and everything about the way she feels under his hands.

The words are soft and open and _him. _The man she knows. Not whoever he's been playing at. It's him and the relief hits her like a wave. An ache unfurls inside her and she anchors herself against him. She hangs on for dear life while it unravels every nerve.

His hands are soothing on her back, then. While she comes down, it's all light, calming caresses at her shoulder and her hip and the soft skin of her wrist when the last shivering wave finally recedes.

He blinks up at her in surprise when she straightens her arms. Her hair falls forward, a curtain around the two of them and it's dark and quiet and warm and she just wants to stay in the moment.

"You," she says and her voice is firm. Definite and insistent and a little aggravated. With him. With herself. With the fact that she wants to say more, but the moment is already long gone. But his face breaks into a wide grin and she loves the lines around his eyes and she hopes it's enough for now.

"You," she says again and she angles her hips up. Circles over him slowly and loves the way it steals his breath when she sinks over him. The way he can't stop his own hips from bucking against her because she's hardly over the wave and it's _so _tight and good. The fact that she can't tell whether the sounds between them are his or hers or something shared. Something they make together in the moment.

It's slow. She needs it to be. She wants this, but it's almost to the point of pain now. She needs it to be, and he seems to know. She doesn't know how he manages it, though. His hands, his teeth are quick and rough and his breath his an erratic mess, but his hips follow her slow, steady pace right to the end.

He follows her right up to the last second and then something breaks in him and her name is an apology on his lips and he's thrusting into her with short, hard strokes and it's too much. It hurts and her teeth scrape against his skin and then everything goes brilliant. It's not pain any more and she cuts off his apology with her own mouth. With her tongue seeking the lingering taste of herself and it's not pain.

She's blinking and disoriented when he lifts her off him and lays her gently on the bed. His hand hovers at her hip like he's afraid to touch her and he's pressing chaste kisses to her forehead, whispering something over and over.

She grins up at him. His brow furrows and half his mouth turns up and a laugh tips out of her and into the hard line of his jaw. She strokes a palm over his cheek and his eyes drop. He looks tired. Not just exhausted and worn out with this—_this—_but really tired.

She wonders how much he slept. If he dozed all night and pulled himself up and out of sleep over and over so so he'd wake when she did and he could keep her with him like this. If he lay awake all night wondering. _Wondering. _

"Tired?" she asks after a long string of quiet heartbeats. They look at each other in surprise that the question comes from her. That it's not him, trying to keep the worry out of his voice because he knows she hates it. She hates him hovering and managing her, but he can't help it sometimes.

Something flickers across his face. Relief, maybe, but something pleased, too. But it's gone right away. She missed it, and he's shaking his head. "Just need a second."

"A second?" She arches an eyebrow at him and shoves his shoulder hard. He's not expecting it. He flops on to his back. She hooks her thigh over his hip and drapes a heavy arm over his chest.

"God, _Kate,_" he groans as she circles his nipple with a fingertip.

"You're tired, Castle." It's a teasing sing song in his ear, but she lets him off the hook. Flattens her palm against his shoulder and runs soothing fingers along his collar bone. "Sleep. It's ok."

His eyes drift closed, but he's not quite ready to give in. "It's late. Should probably get up." One eye cracks open. "You have things to do?" The question is bleary and indistinct.

"In a while," she says softly. She nestles her cheek against his shoulder and pulls the covers up to her chin.

"Yeah?" He's surprised. His eyelids flick open and closed again.

"Yeah." She settles in. "Yeah."

"Thanks," he says faintly and she feels his limbs loosen and his spine go soft beneath her. He's half gone already, but the word breaks her heart.

"Castle?" she says quickly. "You are. You are my type."

"Mmm." His lips find her skin, seeking warmth. "Mmm. 'Kay."

But her heart breaks again. He doesn't have her answer. Not really. He's already asleep.

He's still wondering.


	2. Outside Force

A/N: Sorry there was a longer lull between updates than I intended. The couple of chapters of Material Witness and the most recent TARDIS-verse (History, Moving Quickly) barged their way in. Oh, and Going Wild, too. Brain is prolific and disorganized lately. And I actually had a much longer chapter written that I was going to post as the second and final, but then brain said, "Dumbass, this is actually chapters 2 and 4; I am writing chapter 3 in the background." So this will be four chapters, and chapter 3 should be up by the end of the week. Chapter 4 will follow close on its heels, as it's already written.

* * *

She's been watching him lately. That's new.

It's new and more than a little awkward, because he's been watching her. Of _course_ he's been watching her. He's been watching her for four years. That's not new at all.

At first he thinks she's mad. That he's done something and she's waiting for him to realize it. To realize that he's in trouble.

It's not a bad working theory. Her being mad—him being in trouble— would_ not_ be new: He watches, he gets in trouble, she gets mad. It's kind of their thing. It's kind of always been their thing. But she doesn't seem mad. She seems . . . curious. Interested.

And determined, maybe?

Determined is part of it. He catches her watching, and she doesn't look away these days. Most of the time she doesn't look away. And even when she does—even when that old instinct rises up—she fights it. She takes hold of herself and squares her shoulders and meets his eye again.

Yeah, she's determined. He just doesn't know what she's determined about.

He just knows she's watching him and he's still watching her. So there's all this sudden eye contact and mutual watching and _that _is a recipe for trouble in the workplace. Trouble out of the workplace, too, because she's been watching him all the time and when they're not at work, she makes good on it.

And sometimes she makes good on it when they _are _at work. That's not _exactly_ new. This all started with her on suspension. It started with life and death and _finally_ and so much time to make up for. It started with her on suspension and what felt like nothing but time.

With days and days and days where they hardly ate or slept or had any space between them. Days and days and days that he's still recovering memories from, sometimes at the most inopportune moments.

That's the problem with her watching, too. Because he glances up at her. He glances up when, for once, he hasn't been watching, and he remembers something. A sound she made or just the way the light hit the small of her back and he had no idea whether it was day or night because he was just lost in it. He'll remember something like that and he glances up and she's _watching_ and there is mutual trouble in the workplace.

Not that it's not good. Not that trouble in the workplace is not a special and exquisite kind of good that is definitely not new. Because after days and days and days, suddenly she had to go back to work and it turned out that wasn't nearly enough time. And as freaked out as she was early on there were still stairwells and closets and mostly unused interrogation rooms. Right from the beginning there was making good, because really, they have _four years_ of not making good to make good on.

She's just as eager about that as he is. Making good. They've always clicked at work and the temptation to follow that to its logical conclusion now that they can? Now that temptation and logical conclusion are things that they do . . . well, the eagerness isn't new.

But something's different there, too. Something _is_ new about it, although he's just putting that piece together with the others. With the fact that she's watching him. That's the first piece. And she's not hiding it. That's the second.

And on top of all that there's less . . . coaxing on his part recently. In general, but especially when it comes to making good in the workplace. They're still in the closet there. They have to be. But lately they've been _literally _in the closet a lot more frequently. Or the machine room. Or under the stairs. And once on a desk in a section of Robbery undergoing a remodel and _that_ was not his idea.

And if none of that's new, it's different. It's not always him coaxing or lying in wait or even sending her a pleading look.

If anything, he's trying to be good. He's trying to respect her boundaries and make sure she knows that _he _knows her job is important. Even when it's deadly boring, it's important and boring is not some kind of invitation to a clandestine free for all. So he hasn't been coaxing. He hasn't been coaxing as _much._

He's been going on a lot of improvised errands to pass the time because there's so much paperwork lately. Or maybe it's not lately. It's probably not lately. It's probably the same amount as it's always been, but he's there more.

He doesn't just come in for the Beckett-flavored cases. He's there more because he hates when she leaves without him in the morning. Even when he's been up all night writing. Even when he's still writing and it's time for her to go.

He hates for her to leave without him, so he says that maybe he'll come in for a while, even if there's not much going on. He says he'll come in and help her with the paperwork and he's still buttoning his shirt while they're walking out the door and people _must_ have noticed the sharp decline in his standards for personal grooming some days and he doesn't care. He doesn't _care_ because he hates for her to leave without him.

She seems to hate it, too. He thinks she always has. Since before the storm, even. He used to experiment. He still has the notes and she's seen them and asked about them and someday she'll get it out of him. Someday the funny story he makes up won't be enough and she'll look at him sharply and he'll be in trouble, but he used to experiment.

He'd stay away. He'd mark the time. In days earlier on. Hours later when he couldn't stand it. He'd mark the time he stayed away and he'd count. Everything. Smiles. Sharp words. Eyerolls, of course. He'd count it all and plot it against the time he stayed away and he thinks she's always hated it. Or it's near enough to always that she can't really remember when she didn't want him around.

But it's another new thing lately. She doesn't work at hiding that she hates it. She doesn't make a show of how in the way he is. Oh, she gives him shit. That's eternal and he wouldn't have it any other way. She needles him about when he last showered and says _Help _in sarcastic quote marks on paperwork days, but she doesn't fight him on it. She doesn't get that annoyed little _vee _between her eyebrows and snap at him the whole way to the precinct.

And they go to the precinct together most of the time. Almost always nowadays. That's new, too. They drive together or walk and he kills time getting their coffee and tries not to make it too much like clockwork. He tries to stagger how much later than her that he gets in, but he's not sure he's pulling it off.

He's just _there _more and people have to notice. They have to notice that he's there, but he gets bored just as easily and she humors him and how could people _not _notice?

So he tries to be good. He tells her that his butt is falling asleep from too much time in the chair and he makes up things he has to do right now. He goes on improvised errands.

He's trying to be good, but more often than not, lately, she comes after him.

She follows and stakes out some shadowy corner and snags his sleeve or grabs him by the belt loop as he's passing by. He actually can't remember the last time he was the one doing the ambushing, now that he thinks about it.

That kind of trashes the "mad" theory, too. Not just the fact of it. Mad and making good in the workplace are not exactly strangers as far as the two of them are concerned. Sometimes mad and making good are fast friends and there's not a thing wrong with that.

There are a lot of things _right _with it when it comes to making good in the workplace. There's a certain . . . efficiency that goes with mad. Quiet, furious efficiency. Especially for her. But that's not how it is lately.

Lately, she has this smile.

And that's another new thing. New thing number four. Or maybe number three, part B. He's losing count and he wonders idly when all this started.

It's another new thing anyway. It's not just that she's not mad. It's not just that it's not fast and hard and angry. (Or not always, anyway. Not always.)

It's that she follows and finds a place where they can have a few minutes together. Where she can smile at him and he can work the knots out of her shoulders. Where they can plan an evening. They can plan for the weekend and talk about things that need doing around the house. His and hers.

She finds a place for them to be normal together. And that's new, too. These mundane things she makes time for even though she's busy and they're at work and really it's absurd the number of people who already know and they have to be careful. And she still makes time.

And sometimes it's not mundane at all. It's not practical. It's not a good idea. It's trouble and she catches him by the sleeve and pulls him along with her and she has this smile for him. Not the one that has him scrambling to remember what he has to be sorry for. Not the one that makes him swallow hard and scan for emergency exits. Not the one that says _We are going to get this done _quickly _and _quietly.

It's the one that starts out small and shy, but then it lights up her whole face. The one that goes on long enough that he gets lost in it. That he forgets to breathe. The one that comes with her stepping into him and bringing his mouth down to hers. The one that has her breathing for them both.

It's the one he sees right now. As he's rounding the corner between floors and there it is. There she is. Reaching for him and stumbling backwards. Taking him with her and kissing him like they have time. Like she has time for him and this even though the stack of files on her desk is tall enough that it keeps losing vertical integrity.

She breaks the kiss and he pulls himself together. She has work to do and _boundaries_ and _respect_ and _the workplace_ all that. He takes a step back. He tries to take a step back. He tries to be good, but she still has him by the shoulder. She still has him by both shoulders and she slides her hands up, not down, and links them behind his neck.

"I thought you had work to do." The words slip out and he can hardly believe it's his voice. He presses his lips against hers like he can erase them.

"I thought _you _had writing to do today," she retorts. And she presses _her _lips against _his_ like she's telling him something.

She is. He's just not sure what.

Maybe she's had enough and she's just trying to be nice about it. Maybe she wants him out of her hair, even though he thought he was being good. That's probably what she's trying to tell him.

"You want me to go?" He means for it to be an offer, but it comes out plaintive and he tries not to squirm. He _does _have writing to do, but he misses her and he doesn't want to go.

But she kisses him again. Just an unhurried brush of her lips over his and it doesn't feel like she's just being nice. She _is _being nice, but not nice like she's trying to tell him to get the hell out. Only nicely. It doesn't feel like that at all, because their breath is mingling and she's standing there with her forehead pressed against his like she has time for this.

She tips her head back a little so she can look at him. "Do you need to?"

He shakes his head. He reaches for words, but she's _watching _him and he can't find them, so he shakes his head.

Her eyes drift closed and she smiles. She _smiles_ and she's not mad and she's not just being nice. She's determined.

"Then, no," she whispers. "I don't want you to go."


	3. Acted Upon

A/N: Fourth and final chapter coming sooooooon. Thank you for reading and reviewing!

* * *

It doesn't feel like work. It _is _work. It's changing course and being mindful and resisting patterns old enough to feel like instinct. But it doesn't feel like work and she had expected it to.

She'd been bracing for it. Paralyzed and frustrated and _bracing _for it. Angry enough to go to Burke. To pace the perimeter of his _ugly_ office rug with her elbows pulled in against her sides and one hand fluttering over her scar. Angry with herself because she expected it to be work and she didn't know if she could do it.

So she'd gone to Burke and he'd been maddening and inscrutable and vaguely amused. But she'd gone to him and asked for help. Told him that she had screwed everything up. That she'd been screwing everything up all these months and hadn't even realized it.

Burke had smiled and reflected her questions back at her and she'd wondered what the hell else she had expected. How she could have possibly forgotten that this was part of it. The work. The exhaustion of sorting through all _this _on top of fighting and fighting and fighting herself all the time. The exhaustion of his pen moving across the page at the oddest moments and that horrible rug.

But she had asked for help and Burke had listened. He'd shaken his head and told her that, no, he didn't think she needed to see him any more often. And when she'd asked what the hell, in his opinion, she _did _need—when she'd tamped down the urge to drop a match on that _ugly _fucking rug and walk out with flames rising behind her—she had asked, and he'd given her nothing more than two quiet words and the promise that he'd see her next month.

Two words: _Let yourself. _

And she had.

Just . . . not right away.

Right away she'd called him. She'd called Castle and backed out of their evening. Nothing major. Dinner and most likely him talking her into staying the night and he'd been fine about it. He'd whined a little, mostly for effect, though. _Mostly._ And he'd been disappointed, but he was careful not to show it too much. And he hadn't been surprised. He hadn't been surprised at all, and that's it. That's exactly it.

Right away, she'd gone home and held the middle of her living room floor down with her heavy head and exhausted limbs and stared. For hours, she'd stared at the ceiling. Dry eyed and hopeless and bracing the work she wasn't sure she could do.

And then there was the itch. A literal itch. Metaphorical, too. Always that, though it would never have moved her. It probably wouldn't have. At work maybe. At work, she might have . . . well. She might have and that's when she'd realized. That's when it had occurred to her that it was part of the problem. Part of the reason why he wonders.

_Am I your type, Beckett?_

But the literal itch had her twisting and urgent and overwhelmed. The one in the middle of her back that she'd never been able to reach. The one that made everything pull and hurt whenever she would try to get at it—her scar and her ribs and piece of herself she'd had to put back together. And suddenly, the itch had her moving.

She hadn't even cared that it was almost 2 AM. She hadn't even _realized_ it was almost 2 AM until it took her forever to find a cab and then no time at all to end up at the loft. No traffic and no time at all before she was climbing the stairs. Before her key was in the door and there he was, huddled and blank faced in the office doorway.

And then she had cared. Then she had worried. About the fact that he'd been awake. There was no question about that. Because his face was grey in the dim light and he hadn't been sleeping or working or doing much of anything other that maybe worrying.

Wondering.

_Am I your type, Kate? _

Then she had cared and she'd closed the distance between them and pulled his mouth down to hers. Then she'd turned away and stretched her arms overhead and leaned herself against the bookshelf. Then she'd said _Itch!_ crossly and he had laughed and twitched the hem of her sweater up without a moment's hesitation.

Then his hands had been on her. The exact spot. The perfect combination of flat nails and fingertips and fantastic pressure. Then he'd crowded against her and whispered— open mouthed against her neck—he'd whispered that he was glad to know she needed him for something.

She'd gone still then. Still and tipping on the edge of the next moment.

And then she'd let herself.

She'd turned in his arms and lifted her face up to his and showed him. She'd fixed it so he couldn't help seeing and she couldn't help letting him.

"Lots of things," she'd said. Low and quiet and the metaphorical itch underneath, but more than that. More than _just_ that. "Need you for lots of things."

* * *

She thinks a lot about the metaphorical itch and the things she realized lying on her living room floor. She thinks a lot about it, but it's a while before she does anything with it.

The realization. The _epiphany_, he'd say, if it were the kind of thing they talk about. And she'd roll her eyes and secretly love the sound of it. An _epiphany_, he'd say, because he loves to write her. On and off the page, he loves to write the world around her and her moving through it. The two of them moving through it.

She thinks a lot about the metaphorical itch and her epiphany (because _fine _ it's an epiphany, isn't it?), but it takes her a while to do anything with it. She thinks it's one thing when it's just the two of them. _Letting herself _is something she can do when they're at home.

She's just telling herself she can do that. That she _has _been doing that when all of a sudden she thinks about the _H _word. She thinks about the fact that home is wherever the two of them are together. Her place or his or traveling. Because they travel. They plan ski trips and pick up and go for a quick weekend and wherever they are, that's home.

The thought almost sends her scurrying back to Burke for a few more laps around his ugly rug, but she takes his advice. She lets herself. She lets herself think of it that way. She lets herself like the notion. She lets herself think it's a good thing to have a home and to have it be him.

It's another burden gone. She's lighter for it, and it's another excuse she doesn't have for not thinking about the rest of it. About what it might mean to _let herself _when they're _not_ at home. About the metaphorical itch.

It's always there. The metaphorical itch is always there, but it's worst at work. Because no one can know and she hates that.

And she loves it.

She loves the way it ups the ante and it has to be hard and fast and quiet and no one can know. And it's good. It's _so good_ and she's not alone in that. It's not like he's unwilling. It's not like he doesn't love it, too. The thrill of getting away with something is a definite turn on for Richard Castle.

He scouts locations and ambushes her and makes it his mission in life to bring as close to screaming as possible at every opportunity. At everything that looks like an opportunity if you squint at it. He leaves her clues and maps and meets her furious whispers with hard kisses and no wasted time at all. He loves that no one can know.

But he hates it, too.

He hates it because, really, he wants _everyone_ to know. He wants to shout it from the rooftops and hold her hand on the street and take her places without having to worry who might see them.

He hates it because he loves with his whole self and it's work for him to hide that. It's hard work for him. He's tired at the end of the day and his eyes are dull with the effort. And even though they never really talk about it, she can see that he hates it.

She hates it, too, but not the same way.

She hates that it's anyone's business but hers. But theirs.

It's convenient. That's the heart of the epiphany. Staring up at the ceiling with the literal itch driving her mad, she'd realized that it's _convenient_ for her that no one else can know.

Because it's hard enough. That's what she tells herself when there's a real possibility that their cover is blown and she snaps at him and freezes him out. When she lets him take the blame, whoever's fault it is or might be. Whether there's any blame or not. When she's choked with panic about it, she tells herself it's hard enough with everyone who already knows.

Her father. His family. All their expectations, good and bad and indifferent. The looks they all give both of them. Hopeful and warning and so _full _of expectations.

It's hard enough with the boys and Lanie and fucking Paula and Gina because he insisted they needed to know to head things off at the pass. All of that's hard enough and she bristles and snaps at him when anyone else is around. She freezes him out and sends him away so no one will . . . What? No one will _what?_ So no one will think that she _like_ likes him?

She says it out loud to herself. Just like that. She says it and wonders what the hell is wrong with her. She wonders what he can possibly see in her, given that she has the emotional maturity of a sixth grader.

She wonders about him and she knows why _he_ wonders. That's not a mystery at all anymore when she says it out loud like that.

_Am I your type, Kate? _

Her head aches with it and she's actually dialing Burke's number. She's steeling herself for the rug and the notepad and going in circles in more ways than one when she realizes it's just more of the same, isn't it?

She thinks about the metaphorical itch and sees it for what it's not. What it's not _only. _

It's not just about the thrill. The possibility of discovery and upping the ante. It's not just about furious curses in her ear and the flat of his hand between her teeth because he's so fucking good at hard and fast and a little angry and she's _not _good at quiet. Sometimes she's not good at that at all.

But it's more than just that. She wants him. She wants _him_.

She misses him when he doesn't come in. She misses him when he _does_ and she makes this production of picking on him. Keeping him at arm's length. She misses the meandering conversations that they pick up and put down throughout the day and the way he narrates her life and makes her laugh just when she's turning in on herself. When she's going dark inside and he teases and tugs and braves it all to pull her back out into the light.

She misses him sweeping her hair back when it falls like a curtain between them and she hides behind it. She misses the sharp smile he gets when she lays a four-dollar word on the table and the soft one for when she pays him a compliment.

She misses him when they're not at home and she doesn't need to. It's more of the same, so she does it.

She lets herself.

* * *

It's not actually doing anything new. Not really. It's not _not_ doing things. It's letting herself, and she _hates_ that Burke nailed it. She hates it even though she should be used to it by now.

It's still work. It's effort in its own way. Conscious effort to let herself smile and touch and laugh. To turn toward and not away. To open her mouth and let the truth spill out.

Remembering to do all that is work, and she keeps waiting for the exhaustion. For tears thickening in her throat at the end of a long day of working at it and working at it. She waits for heavy limbs and knots all along her spine and circles under her eyes.

She waits for it to be like it was last year. So much work. So much _hard _work. But that's not how it is now. It's the opposite.

She feels lighter. Easier. She wonders what the difference is. She spends a lot of time wondering.

She's sleeping better, and that's part of it. She _sleeps_. It's incredible. Long, warm, dreamless hours stretched out next to him or twined around him in a welcome tangle of limbs.

She sleeps and when she does dream—when there are nightmares—she reaches for him. She lets herself reach for him and he comes up out of sleep. Just barely out of sleep, but right away every time, and he murmurs to her_—I'm here. I'm here, Kate_—and he settles the covers back over the two of them and it's incredible. The sheets drifting to rest on her skin and the weight of his hand on her hip or her ribcage or her shoulder. It's like magic.

It's not just at home, either.

She smiles at work and it's so much easier than hiding it. It's so much easier that she has to be a different kind of careful, because he brings her coffee and mumbles in his chair. He thinks out loud and her smile almost turns into a laugh right then and there when he sees her smiling and he stops cold.

He blinks at her and he's so _adorable _when he's confused. It almost turns into a laugh and then it almost turns into something else and then it _does _turn into something else. She lets it turn into something else because _why not?_

He makes himself scarce and she wonders why. She wonders and she follows him and that makes him blink, too. She smiles and she laughs and she lets it turn into something else at the shadowy end of that hallway no one ever uses. It turns into so many long, slow kisses that she loses count, and when she has to go—and then when she _really _has to go another half dozen kisses later—he's dazed.

He blinks at her and she can't resist. She doesn't resist. She lets herself tell him that was just what she needed. And they go their separate ways to head back to the bull pen, but she has to grab him by the elbow so he doesn't walk into a wall.

She keeps smiling the next day and the next.

She stops waiting for it to feel like work, but she doesn't stop wondering what's different.

She keeps following him and stealing moments here and there. She lets him follow her and keep her company. In the mornings she tells him to hurry so he can ride with her and when they get there he just looks both ways and slips from the car and tells her he'll see her soon.

_Soon_ is a moving target. Sometimes it's ten minutes, sometimes half an hour. Once in a while it's long enough that she's staring at the elevator every ten seconds and she's not sure that falls under the heading of _letting herself._

It's a paperwork day when she figures it out. Why she's not exhausted with this. Why it's work but it doesn't feel like it.

It's a paperwork day and he's making himself useful. Really. He is. Oh, he knocks things over and rearranges her _in_ and_ out _trays and swears he read somewhere that it's more efficient. He's _annoying_, but he's useful, too. He comes and goes. He keeps her coffee warm and refills her paperclips. He makes a note that they should have an organization consultant look at the supply closet, because its' a _wreck. _

They bicker about the trays and where the elephants go and that turns into something like trouble. She's giving him her hard stare across the desk and he doesn't flinch. She tells him that she's going to staple his fingers to the desk if he doesn't step away from the elephants. He leans in and his eyebrow twitches up and she's just thinking that _letting herself_ also means letting hard and fast and a little angry happen every once in a while.

She's just making a pretty compelling internal argument for every once in a while when he straightens up. He straightens up and turns away. He kills the moment—absolutely kills it—and he goes. He's making small talk with LT and some other uniforms by the elevator. He gets _on_ the elevator. Heactually gets on the elevator and gives her a distracted wave as the doors close.

Her mouth snaps shut because she can't just stand there with it hanging open. She drops into her chair because she can't seem to stand anymore at all.

She's about to go after him. Just as soon as she can get her feet under her again, she's about to charge down the stairs and go after him and ask what the hell he's playing at.

But her phone buzzes and the hair on the back of her neck pricks up two seconds before the Captain's voice rings out across the bullpen. It has that particular note of menace that means she's out for blood.

Beckett is equal parts grateful it doesn't seem to be _her _blood right this minute and sympathetic to Reston who makes a determined effort not to drag his feet as he passes by. The Captain's door slams and something about it jars everything in her mind. The pieces tumble together and she figures it out.

It's work, but it doesn't feel like it because they're doing it together.

She thumbs her phone on and the text lights up.

_Gates. Prying eyes. Making myself scarce. Try not to miss me too much. _

She grins, though he's the only one who'd know it for what it is.

She grins and goes after him.

* * *

It's not ideal. It's not where she wants to do this, because _this _isn't what she wants to do at all, but he's through the lobby and out the door. He's on the street.

She goes after him. She crosses the lobby in long strides. She can't have what she wants—not right now—but she won't settle for nothing. She pushes through the door and blinks in the sunlight.

"Castle!" She raises her voice. She'd rather not, because who knows who's milling around. It's the precinct's damned doorstep and she doesn't _care_. She really doesn't give a damn who's milling around, but she doesn't want to undo his work.

_Work_. She grins again and it's something pretty much anyone would recognize.

He turns and _he _certainly recognizes it. He blinks. "Ka . . . Beckett?"

She closes the distance and tugs on his sleeve. There's not much in the way of cover out on the street here. Nothing really, but she pulls him out of the flow of traffic and into a shadow. There's a shadow at least and she steps into him, just for a second, and meets his eyes.

He blinks. "Did you not . . . did you get my text?"

She nods. She wants to say something, but there's too much. She grins.

"Kate." Her name rushes out of him along with what she's guessing is all the air in his lungs. "Don't."

"Don't what?" She's still grinning.

His hand snakes out and he grabs her wrist. Lightning fast, he brings her palm to his lips and drops it again. "Don't look at me like that in broad daylight when I have to _go_."

His voice is so low she feels it in her belly. She's not grinning anymore, but judging from the look he's giving her, it's not an improvement from his point of view.

"I have to go, don't I?" He's closer now and she's not sure how. She's been watching him and he hasn't moved, but he's _closer_.

"You should go," she says, but neither of them is moving.

A horn blares and a driver curses and it breaks the spell.

He shakes himself and smiles down at her for a second and then he's going. He turns and he's going, but she stops him again.

"I will, though," she says suddenly. Her voice is shaky and she's blushing.

"Will?" He turns back, but only a little. Like he's wary. Like she might grin at him again. She might.

"Miss you too much." She does.

But _he's_ grinning now, too, and she knows what he means about not looking like that when he has to go. But he does. He has to go. She has to go, too.

"Maybe I'll make it up to you," he says and he stumbles back like he's hoping for minimum safe distance.

She laughs, because there's no such thing. He laughs, too, because he knows what she's thinking. He laughs and stumbles on.

"Maybe," she calls after him. "Maybe I'll let you."


	4. Remain at Rest

A/N: Fourth and final chapter. Thank you all for taking this little ride with me and for your kind and thoughtful reviews!

* * *

"I love your hands."

He's almost asleep when she says it. It's late and the day has been longer than long and the words hang in the darkness. They're quiet and matter of fact and so unlike her that he thinks he imagined them at first. He thinks he must have dropped over the edge into sleep and imagined them.

Everything about the moment is a little unreal. They're curled up with her back to his front, actually sharing a pillow, and that's unusual enough. It's unusual enough that she has his arm pulled across her. That she's the one who settled their bodies like this. That she has his fingers splayed out and she's pressing his palm to her skin. She has it resting against her just so. Just where the two halves of her rib cage sweep away and he can feel the breath gliding in and out of her. It's all unusual enough.

He can feel the words—the shape and weight of each one as she forms it and sets it free. He can feel the moment she releases each one and lets it hang there in the darkness. It's more than just a little unreal. It's new. It's all new and he's lost count of them all and he can't remember when this started. He's lost track of how many little steps it's taken to get here. To this moment.

She says it again, though. Softer this time, but not at all like she's uncertain. He realizes he's holding his breath. She goes on. There are more words and she's tracing the perimeter of his hand now. She's trailing a neat, blunt nail up and down and around the ray of each finger. An outline of him sketched on her skin.

"I love your hands." She says it again. Three times. Like a spell. Like a fairytale. And that's what it is. A story. He feels it as much as hears it. Her ribs rise against his palm and recede and she chooses each word carefully. She tells him a story.

"I didn't think you were real." Her nails trail over the back of his hand and she slides her fingers into the broad spaces between his. "I saw you lots of places. Morning shows and local news. Page six. I liked seeing you. But I didn't think you were real."

She pauses and he thinks she must be done. So many words together and she must be done. He half wonders how long the silence will stretch out from this moment. He worries, like she has a finite supply of words and she's used so many just now. _So many. _

But it's just a pause. One beat, then another and she goes on.

"I liked to listen." She reaches her free hand up and runs a finger down his throat. She traces an unerring line from the tip of his chin to the notch of his sternum and he doesn't think his skin will ever be the same.

"I love your voice, too," she says, but it's an aside. It's a promise. Another story for another day and he pulls in a breath more because he should than because he wants to. It's a promise, but this is so new, he's afraid he'll break the spell.

But she goes on. More words and more of the story. It settles over him in stages. Pieces. He's not used to so many words together from her. Not like this. Not hanging in the darkness. Not with him lying there with her. The quiet one. The still one. The one waiting while her fingers are busy, and now she chooses her words in twos and threes and they settle over him in stages.

"I stood in line," she says and her palm is heavy over the back of his hand. Their hands together are heavy, a counterweight to the ebb and flow of her words.

"I stood in line and you had this Band-Aid." Her fingertips travels over his skin. They skim over the spot. There's a scar. Hardly anything now except a sweeping arc that shines a little in the right light, but she traces it. She knows its exact size and shape. It's been years and he'd practically forgotten it, but she knows it. "Purple and pink with some cartoon character. I meant to look when it was my turn. I meant to ask. But I forgot."

She tips her chin way back to look up at him and he can't read her. She's smiling and it's playful and wary and open and unsure all at the same time. She holds his gaze for half a minute and decides on something. "I was star-struck."

He knows then. He knows that she's worried, too. That she wants this moment for them both. That she's the one making it and it's new and fragile and she's worried that he'll run his mouth off. That he'll be smug and satisfied and break it to pieces.

He's worried, too. For a minute anyway. But it's not there. The insecurity and bravado are just gone—mostly gone—and in their place is something new that he knows. Something he's sure of. It makes him quiet.

She waits and he's just quiet. He's shaky and he wants to help, but he doesn't know how, so he's quiet.

And then her smile softens and her lips just barely graze his chin and the worry goes out of her as she settles back to the pillow. "You weren't what I expected. And you were. You were cocky and a flirt. But the line was really long, and you took a little time with almost everyone and you _weren't_ like that. When you took time. I didn't expect you to be real and when when it was my turn, I was so surprised that I forgot everything I wanted to say."

She spreads her fingers wide over his. She sets her whole hand inside the frame of his and he loves the contrast like always. His feel broad and clumsy and he loves her hands, too. He loves that they're elegant and slender and strong and every time she touches him, it's like she lends him a little of her grace.

He closes his eyes and breathes. His ribs rise and his chest fits against her spine and it's this new, perfect moment they've just made. She's just made for them.

He wants to say something. He expects the words to come spilling out, but it's the opposite. This is a confession he's been half anticipating for a long time. He's seen the book and she knows.

She has to have known all along. She must have known all this time that he saw them the minute he walked into her place that first time. All those hardcovers in a row. The repetition of his own name.

She must have known that he had hardly waited for her bedroom door to close that night before he took them down one by one and rifled through them. That he examined every corner looking for dog ears. That he slid his fingers over every spine and edge in search of wear. For any sign of what she liked. What she didn't like.

She has to have known that he grinned over her bookplates. That she has them at all. That they're personalized. Her name in elegant type. The way they're affixed with care to each and every book. _From the library of . ._ .

She must have known that he saw it. His own signature and a note. A little more than he usually writes, but nothing special. Nothing nearly special enough for her and he wants to remedy that. He's wanted to since he first saw it at her old place.

She has to have known that he looked again. The very first time at her new place. That he'd looked for it and been relieved—_so_ relieved—to see it. She has all his books, but that one. _That_ one with its contagious magic. The remnant of a moment he doesn't remember.

She has to know that he signed another copy for her. She has to know that he's wanted to replace it all this time. _That_ one with its charred edges warped by water and the terrible smell of smoke. The one with a note that isn't nearly enough.

He'd signed a new one. A new one with a new note. Something better. Something almost enough. It was a long time ago—even before he knew she still had that one—he'd signed a new one. And then he crossed that out and wrote another note and another and another. Weeks later and months later and bleeding into years. He's held on to it for years and tried to make it enough. It's a mess. It's a mess and it's still not enough.

She has to know that he's been racking his brain since the first night he saw it. That he'd taken her warning about sleeping with a gun to heart and he'd almost gone to her anyway, because he wanted to know. He _had_ to know. He's racked his brain ever since, but he doesn't remember. He doesn't remember at all, and it's a cold, hollow place where the moment should be.

But now the story settles over him and sinks in. Her story. A gift. Something new she's giving him and he doesn't know why. _Why now?_

He doesn't know, but it fills him up with light and this bubbling excitement and no words at all. He presses his lips to the crook of her neck and he can't even get her name out.

He remembers the Band-Aid. It was a deep cut on his right hand. He probably could have used a stitch or two, but Alexis was so sorry. One of the rare times she'd pushed her boundaries and it had come back to bite her almost immediately. To bite _him,_ actually.

She'd taken an antique paper knife from his desk and used it for something or other. Used it for the sake of using it because she wasn't supposed to, maybe, and she'd put it back wrong. He'd sliced open the back of his hand the next time he went blindly rooting around in the jumble of his desk drawer. She'd been so tearful and alarmed that he'd done his best to laugh it off.

"It hurt," he says suddenly. It feels right. His words meeting hers. Hanging in the air and tangling together. She has more of the moment than he does, but not all of it.

He doesn't know why she's telling him. Why after all this time she's telling him, but he's thankful. He wants to give her something, and he can give her this. It's not enough. His side of the story isn't nearly enough, but it's all he has of it. And it's more of the moment. He can give that to her.

"It hurt," he repeats. "It had finally scabbed over and it pulled every time I forgot and grabbed a book with that hand."

He thinks a moment. He squeezes his eyes shut and wills himself to remember. And he does. He remembers some things. He doesn't remember her. No matter how he tries, he just can't picture her, but something clicks and it's relief. It's connection. It's something. It's just a little more than he's had to hold on to since he first slipped the book from her shelf. "Pen! That's why I signed it with pen on the inside. It hurt to hold a sharpie and everything took longer."

He tells her his part of the story. It's brief and inelegant, but he feels her heartbeat speed up. He feels it hammering suddenly beneath the weight of their joined hands, and he wonders why. He wonders if he can ask. If it will break the spell. If the unreal moment will dissolve.

But then she twists her head around to smile up at him. She asks about the knife. He still has it and she knows it. She describes it exactly and she knows where it is right now. Her words tumble fast and she's pleased. She's so _pleased_ at the connection.

"I like it," she says simply as she turns her whole body toward him. As she kisses him with a sweet, satisfied smile. She shrugs down and his other arm comes around her. "I like that I got to ask after all this time."

His hand spans the distance between her bare shoulder blades and her eyes drift closed on a contented shiver. They lie there together and her heart is still tripping along and his with it.

Half his mind is frantic. Half his mind is scrambling for words to keep this. To pin down the memory. Everything he can gather from then and everything she's giving him now.

And half his mind is here—_here._ With her in this unreal moment. _Here,_ with this lazy energy twining around them. Tugging her mouth up to his. Inching their hands together up her body and _oh, thank_ God, he thinks.

The thought spills into his mind so suddenly that it surprises him. Because he _wants_ her, even though they just . . . even though he was almost asleep. Even though he doesn't want to spoil this. He doesn't want this moment to be over, but he _wants _her and _oh, thank _God.

She's leading him. She's making his palm heavy and rough at one breast, light and teasing at the other. She's showing him exactly what she wants and her mouth opens on this soundless miracle when it's just right. When he pinches one nipple, then the other and soothes each in turn with his mouth. When he goes a little further—when he's sharper and rougher and more insistent with hands and teeth than he usually would be—and she urges him on.

She lets his hands go, then. She's on her back and her arms are stretching up and up like she wants them out of the way. Like she can't get enough of her body under his hands and hers are nothing but trouble.

And she's still talking and the unreal moment draws out because she's not like this. She's silent, mostly. Silent until the very last second. Until she breaks and then it's curses through her teeth. Then it's filthy, dark, fantastic things that chase him over the edge in a hurry.

But she's _talking_ now. It's disjointed and breathy and it's hardly sound at all sometimes, but she's talking about his hands. What they're doing. What they've done to her. How she's loved them since the first moment she realized he was real. Fantasies and possibilities are spilling from her lips and it's unreal.

He drifts down her body. His mouth and hands drift and she doesn't hurry him. She doesn't rush him along or insist and that's new. She . . . _suggests_ things. Her hip presses up from the bed into the sharpness of his teeth and his name caught in her throat tells him that it's good.

His tongue sweeps up her inner thigh and her words trail off. He feels her hands hovering. He expects to feel them fisting in his hair the next second because she's impatient. She's always impatient with this. She has definite ideas about this part and he expects the insistent tug and the sharp, wordless orders. He expects it and his head pops up, surprised when her hands hover and withdraw.

She's peering down at him and her face is such a picture of consternation that he laughs and she glares. For a second he worries that he's ruined something. But one of his hands finds one of hers and he drags it down to his mouth. Their tangled fingers brush together over the warm, wet heat between her legs and the world's longest shudder runs through her body.

His tongue flicks over her fingertips one by one and he sets her hand aside. He lays it to rest, gentle and emphatic against her hip, and trails his own fingers in a slow, meandering pattern, down and down and down. She watches him for another long moment, then draws both her hands slowly, deliberately up her body. She lingers with her palms trailing heavy over her breasts, and her name spills out of him in a low, desperate groan.

It's the first thing he's said in a long time and they're both startled by it. They're _both _startled and the newness of it makes him fierce and protective. He buries his mouth against her thigh and she shushes him crossly and he's lit up inside with it all. With this new thing between them and how much they both want it to work.

He meets her eyes one last time. One last time before her lids drop closed for good and her fingers curl around the pillow. She makes determined fists on either side of her head and her words come again. Slow and fast and throaty and full and hardly words at all. They trickle out intermittently and all in a rush.

His hands roam over her and his mouth is lazy at her hip and low on her stomach and between her thighs. He doesn't even know it's happening at first. That she's coming. He's not sure she does either. There's just a hitch of breath and a sudden snarl of tension that comes and goes—that comes and goes through her from head to toe—and it's like nothing ever before.

He glides up her body and finds her mouth with his. Her hips press and roll with the curve of his hand and it feels like it might go on forever. He's fine with that. He's fine with her words still stuttering out of her, asking and telling just _saying_ like she's been keeping them inside all this time and they have to come out now. _Now. _And he's fine with that, too.

It feels like it might go on forever, but something changes. Something ends or starts over again, and her hands work their way free of the pillow. She reaches down between them and circles his wrist with her fingers. She drags his palm up her body to her lips. Her calf winds around his and she settles him over her. She curls her hips up and coaxes him inside and he wonders if he'll ever breathe again, let alone speak.

Her eyes flutter closed and her tongue runs over his fingertips. She lets his hand go and her fingers brace against his jaw. She opens her eyes with an effort. Her eyelids are heavy—so heavy—but she's watching him. She's watching him and waiting and he can't look away. He can't and she knows and that satisfies her and he feels like he's in trouble. _So_ much trouble.

She nods. He is. He _is_ in trouble and her tongue peeks out of the corner of her mouth. Her head falls back and he feels the words. Each one starting on a breath beneath him and his head falls to her shoulder and they break around him. He moves with her and her words break around him.

"God, Castle, I love your hands."


End file.
